ing their candles and singing. Each night they marched and sang in
this way until at last it was Christmas Eve.

Dona Teresa and the twins went to bed early that night because there was
to be high mass in the little chapel at midnight. Dona Teresa slept with
one eye open, fearing she might be late, and a few minutes before twelve
she was up again.

She washed the Twins' faces to wake them, and then they all three walked
in the starlight to the little chapel near the Big House. The altar was
blazing with lights, and the floor was covered with the dark figures of
kneeling men and women, as the mother and children went in out of the
darkness and found a place for themselves in a corner near the door.

When the service was over, Dona Teresa hurried home to set the house in
order and to prepare the Christmas dinner for the Twins. She had made up
her mind that the red rooster must surely be caught and cooked, because
she wanted to keep the turkey until Pancho should be at home to share
in the feast.

She had planned it all carefully. "It will be quite easy to creep up
under the fig tree while the red rooster is asleep and seize him by the
legs," she said to the Twins as they walked home from the chapel. "Only
you must be very quiet indeed or he will wake up and crow. You know he
is a light sleeper!"

They slipped through the gate and into the yard as quietly as they
could. They reached the fig tree without making a single sound and Dona
Teresa peered cautiously into the dark branches.

She saw a large shadow at the end of the limb where the red rooster
always slept and, stretching her hand very stealthily up through the
branches, she suddenly grabbed him by the legs--or she thought she did.

But the owner of the legs gobbled loud enough to wake every one in the
village, if they hadn't been awake already!

"It's the turkey, after all," gasped Dona Teresa. Just then there was a
loud crow from the roof, and they saw the silhouette of the red rooster
making all haste to reach the ridge-pole and fly down on the other side.

Dona Teresa was in despair, but she held on to the turkey. "That rooster
is bewitched," she said.

Just then the turkey stopped gobbling long enough to peck vigorously at
Tonio, who came to help his mother, and Dona Teresa said, "Well, then,
we'll eat the turkey, anyway, though I had hoped to wait until your
father gets home. But we must have something for our Christmas dinner,
and there's no telling